The future of niche electric vehicles is looking more exciting than ever after three UK-based specialist automotive businesses have joined forces to manufacture the next-generation of low volume EVs.
Watt EV Holdings Ltd (Watt Electric Vehicles) combines the Watt Electric Vehicle Company (WEVC), vehicle R&D and motorsport experts JSC Automotive Limited (JSC) and vehicle structures experts, Stalcom Automotive Technologies (Stalcom).
With a wealth of expertise in multiple areas of the specialist vehicle electrification sector, Watt Electric Vehicles will design, engineer and sell specialist EVs on a low-to-medium volume scale both in the UK and globally.
Across two UK sites located in the Midlands and Cornwall, Watt Electric Vehicles will manufacture a range of low-volume commercial and passenger electric vehicles. Alongside this, Watt Electric Vehicles will offer production, development, engineering and design services to third-parties and OEMs, enabling them to create almost any low-volume EV they require to suit their business needs.
Neil Yates, Founder and CCO of Watt Electric Vehicles, said: “Amalgamating the expertise, resources, and revenue streams of Watt EV Company, JSC Automotive and Stalcom to form a formidable new powerhouse in low-volume vehicle electrification. Watt Electric Vehicles is poised to exploit the burgeoning demand for rapidly scalable niche electric vehicles, for both the passenger car and light commercial vehicle markets, alongside offering next-generation EV technologies and engineering consulting services.
“Combining the company’s in-house intellectual properties with its strategic external Tier 1 supplier partnerships creates a unique advantage within the niche EV electrification sector. Our first light commercial EV, featuring a flexible range of body styles, is currently undergoing intensive development, and is scheduled to enter production at our new manufacturing site in the Midlands in 2024, before scaling up to 5000 units per year. Watt Electric Vehicles will also deliver a sports coupé with classically inspired design and purist driving appeal underpinned by state-of-the-art EV technology to customers later in 2022.”
Watt Electric Vehicles’ model is based upon a low-investment, low-weight, flexible and scalable cell to chassis e-platform. Known as PACES – Passenger And Commercial EV Skateboard – the proprietary technology features bespoke aluminum lightweight extrusions and ultra-precise laser-cut and CNC-folded pieces, which ingeniously interlock and bond together, creating a technical innovation known as FlexTech.
Flexible, scalable, lightweight and cost-effective, PACES has been specifically designed for low volume manufacture. It can be applied to almost any size or shape of EV, from sports cars to buses – across FWD, RWD and AWD layouts – and complies with all ISO regulations and European Small Series Type Approval crash standards. Its lithium-ion batteries used are sourced from a Tier 1 automotive supplier.
